UDOO: Android Linux Arduino in a tiny single-board computer

$641,614

4,172

What's UDOO?

UDOO is a mini PC that could run either Android or Linux, with an Arduino-compatible board embedded.

UDOO board

UDOO is a powerful prototyping board for software development and design, it’s easy to use and with a few steps you can start using it and creating your projects with minimum knowledge.

UDOO merges different computing worlds in one; each world has its strengths and weaknesses, and all of them are useful today in education as well as Do-It-Yourself (DIY) and rapid prototyping endeavours.

UDOO is an open hardware, low-cost computer equipped with an ARM i.MX6 Freescale processor for Android and Linux, alongside Arduino DUE’s ARM SAM3X, both CPU integrated on the same board!

Give a new vision to the educational framework: the idea is to train up a new generation of engineers, designers and software developers skilled in digital technology: physical computing, multi-media arts, interactive arts, IoT...

Stretch Goals

More iMX6's pins and UDOO Board redesign!Many of you asked for this so we will partially redesign UDOO board at $500K in order to make more pins of the iMX6 available and add more functions:

S/PDIF digital audio in & out through pin headers;

I2S/AC97/SSI digital audio multiplexer through pin headers;

FlexCAN (Flexible Controller Area Network) through pin headers, you will be able to choose if you want to switch this function to the iMX6 or the SAM3X;

Second SD card support through pins header: this means you can plug an external controller for a second SD card or an external controller for an eMMC module!

USB bluetooth dongle!As a second stretch goal, we offer an USB bluetooth dongle that will come along with drivers for both Android and Linux. This stretch goal will be unlocked only after we achieve our first stretch goal.

UDOO specifications

UDOO is a very powerful board based on dual or quad core ARM cortex-A9 CPU with great performance both on Android and Linux OS, and a dedicated ARM processor for the GPIO.

UDOO is an open-source hardware project, all the schematics will be available on the UDOO web site licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license.

Flexible development environment

UDOO is a multi development platform solution for Android, Linux, ArduinoTM and Google ADK 2012. The board is designed to provide a flexible environment that allows to explore the new frontiers of the Internet of Things. UDOO allows you to switch between Linux and Android in a few seconds, simply by replacing the Micro SD card and rebooting the system.

Running LinuxUDOO is a stand alone computer itself and since is based on the Freescale i.MX 6 CPU, it runs an optimized version of Linux Ubuntu for ARM architecture, called Linaro (11.10 at the moment). Linaro environment has everything you need for programming, for example you can use the Arduino IDE to build & upload your sketches to the Arduino-compatible embedded board, without additional/external cable connections.

Blinking an LED

Running AndroidAndroid 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich runs smootly on UDOO giving you all the features of an Android device (further Android releases will be available at the time of distribution). Apps interface with Arduino-compatible embedded board through Accessory Development Kit (ADK) connection for building accessories and smart devices based on Android.

ArduinoTMUDOO is compatible with all the sketches, tutorials and resources available on the Arduino community as well as all the shields, sensors and actuators for Arduino DUE available on the market.

Make

DIY - With UDOO making things is really simple.

Want to build a LED light-controller, a RFid reader or a creative game controller? UDOO allows you to create any kind of project and share it with the community.Combining the flexibility of ArduinoTM with the power of Android or Linux, you can create and update tons of stand-alone solutions without worrying about the linking between the two worlds and their wiring.

UDOO with shield and sensors

Installation - With UDOO digital installations are easy to do.

UDOO board allows to create powerful solutions for Internet of Things, interactive art and embedded devices. Processing, OpenCV, PureData and openFramework are just few of many tools available to program and design interactivity. Touch screen, Full HD video projection, I/O for generic or custom components and any controller you can think about, are ready for your installation.

Prototyping - With UDOO companies can build high level prototype in a fast and easy way.

UDOO provides companies with a powerful tool to create fast prototyping for any kind of needs. Prototyping with physical computing toolkits has become a widespread method for technology development, design exploration and creative expression. The board allows researchers and designers working for companies to quickly create and explore new interaction techniques and design devices in the protptyping sessions of a project. UDOO provides a full suite for developing prototypes based on Android platform alone or combined with ADK2012.

Education

Learn

With UDOO people with different skills in coding and electronics can learn easily. UDOO board is flexible and can be used both by newbies and experts in coding and electronics. With UDOO, people can choose the configuration that fits their level of skills and from there move forward in the direction they prefer. Step-by-step “how to work with electronics” tutorials will be available for every level of expertise while there will be ready-to-go Arduino sketches for those interested in working with codes.

Scratch programming

TeachWith UDOO teachers can teach basic as well as advanced topics with the same low cost hardware. Teachers can use the same platform for teaching different topics, from interaction design to firmware programming to robotics, and explore the possible sinergies among topics. Teachers of different classes and fields can coordinate their action connecting different teams. Using one of the pre-installed programming language, such as Scratch4Arduino, it's possible to teach the basics of programming and hardware development. Students can create and share their own interactive stories, games and even music.

Community

Our aim is to create around UDOO a seamless educational and professional community that could grow according to the challenges posed by the new emerging technologies (e.g. Internet of things, cloud computing, cluster computing, etc.).

We are building this community starting from a small set of selected Universities (Carnegie Mellon, USA; University of California San Diego, USA; Aarhus University, DK; Siena, IT; OCADU Toronto; CA) with the aim of bootstrapping the design process of the board and its accessories and then opening up to the rest of the world.

We will support the community by mean of educational events and competitions and through the development of an educational web site that will sustain teachers and students in their teaching and learning efforts. Furthermore, while keeping the academic world as the main partner in this educational endeavour, we aim at addressing also the basic process of computing literacy in primary and higher school, through Academic projects like Scratch and Squishy Circuits.

The UDOO Web Site will provide examples and resources for get up and running with UDOO and its developping tools for different levels of expertise.

T-shirt

Be part of our community, make a $20 pledge and get this awesome t-shirt!

Who is behind UDOO?

UDOO is a joint effort of SECO USA Inc. (www.seco.com ) and Aidilab (www.aidilab.com), in collaboration with a multidisciplinary team of researchers with expertise in interaction design, embedded electronics, sensor networks and cognitive science, who along the years have worked together in several projects sharing the same vision about the role of technology in human life, and are now spread between North Europe and United States.

Where we're at

We’ve been working on UDOO for over 1 year now. We have formed an awesome team in Siena, Pittsburgh, Toronto and Aarhus. The boards that you see in the video are real working prototypes. We’re 80% ready to have the final product in our hands.

Right now the board is not ready for the final users because we have some issues in hardware and software:

- UDOO needs to be connected via serial cable to run the boot script that load one of the two different OS and to set the desired output hdmi, lvds and resolution.

- The graphic acceleration is not fully functional and there are not stable drivers for camera wi-fi and touch screen (both for linux and android).

- Currently some of the functionalities are linked through physical jumpers while in the future the same connections will be managed via software.

Physical Jumpers

- Furthermore there are still communication issues between Android (while running ADK protocol) and the arduino-compatible embedded board that will be taken care of during the pre-release session.

Risks and challenges

Our goal is to create an easy-to-use product which provides an integrated solution between Arduino - Android - Linux environments in order to make simpler all the DIY projects that require Internet connectivity and high performance computing capability.

As we described in “Where we're at”, before entering mass production, we still have some open issues to solve in the next months.

SECO, which is partner of the project, has over 30 years of experience in design and production of electronics embedded solutions. SECO manufacturing unit is a ISO9001 certified company since 2003.

We are on our way but to further improve UDOO we need to make us known by the EDU and DIY communities and gain their feedback. For this purpose we want to grow an active community around UDOO, providing detailed tutorials and examples of code that will be available on udoo.org website.

References and documentation will be also provided to the community on our website.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $139 or more
About $139

STARTER KIT UDOO DUAL LIMITED - Pledge $139 and get one UDOO dual core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug, plus accessories: 12V 2A AC power adapter localised to country of sale and 2mt HDMI cable. You also get 2 micro SD 8GB with Linux and Android 4 already flashed and ready to run.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $149 or more
About $149

STARTER KIT UDOO DUAL - Pledge $149 and get one UDOO dual core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug, plus accessories: 12V 2A AC power adapter localised to country of sale and 2mt HDMI cable. You also get 2 micro SD 8GB with Linux and Android 4 already flashed and ready to run.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $159 or more
About $159

STARTER KIT UDOO QUAD LIMITED - Pledge $159 and get one UDOO quad core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug, plus accessories: 12V 2A AC power adapter localised to country of sale and 2mt HDMI cable. You also get 2 micro SD 8GB with Linux and Android 4 already flashed and ready to run.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $169 or more
About $169

STARTER KIT UDOO QUAD - Pledge $169 and get one UDOO quad core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug, plus accessories: 12V 2A AC power adapter localised to country of sale and 2mt HDMI cable. You also get 2 micro SD 8GB with Linux and Android 4 already flashed and ready to run.

Kickstarter is not a store.

Pledge $318 or more
About $318

DUAL + QUAD KIT UDOO - Pledge $318 and get one UDOO DUAL core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug AND one UDOO QUAD core version with WiFi module and Ethernet plug.
Plus accessories for both: 2x 12V 2A AC power adapter localised to country of sale and 2x 2mt HDMI cable. You also get 4 micro SD 8GB with Linux and Android 4 already flashed and ready to run. Build your own UDOO network!